Ron Paul lives! So does Elizabeth Kucinich's husband!

Rep. Ron Paul, the 72-year-old libertarian-like, 10-term Texas congressman who's also running for the Republican presidential nomination, easily won his 14th District primary Tuesday and is set for easy re-election in November.

With about half the precincts counted (what's the rush -- it's Texas) Paul was thumping Friendswood City Councilman Chris Peden by two-to-one.

Now, Paul can set his sights on this other old-timer, 71-year-old Sen. John McCain, who claims to have won more than the 1,191 GOP delegates for the Republican presidential nomination this September at the National Convention in St. Paul (no relation to the congressman).

Actually, Paul hasn't really won any Republican primaries in the current political season, though he did take some fourths and fifths and a couple of second place caucus finishes. And he controls somewhere between 12 and 42 delegates, depending on who's counting as if that matters anymore.

But just Paul's powerful presence, eloquence and outspoken defense of the Constitution has forced every other Republican party luminary out of the 2007-08 race, including Rudy Giuliani, who's now reduced to doing bit parts on "Saturday Night Live," Fred Thompson, Mitt Romney, Sam who's-its from Kansas and that grumpy guy from Virginia. Tuesday night, faced with the prospect of a hard-charging Paul on his tail, even former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee gave up, although he directed his concession speech at McCain to save face.

Paul, the only Republican presidential candidate to oppose the Iraq war, is no longer the oldest presidential candidate since the 74-year-old Ralph Nader began his quadrennial quest for 3% of the vote. Paul has declined to endorse McCain, which pretty much dooms the Arizonan's candidacy in the eyes of thousands of Ron Paul Revolutionaries.

Although they have been largely ignored by a media that thought the race involved ...

so-called front-runners like Giuliani and Romney, Paul's army of earnest, dedicated volunteers have fueled the GOP's most successful and recent fundraising quarter, when Paul amassed nearly $20 million. This year so far, according to Paul's campaign website, they've donated an extra $6.14 million.

These volunteers, many of them new to the political process, have organized some 1,400+ meet-up groups that wrote thousands of letters and hand-painted countless signs to wave at motorists in intersections and passing beneath them on interstate bridges all over the country. Their chatrooms coach supporters on what to say and how to say it to encourage broader political support.

These fans fervently scour the Internet at all hours for stories like this to comment on or correct. Some websites refuse to accept their comments so, uh, fervent are they and sometimes trite -- "Ron Paul 2008" and "the Revolution will not be televised." But we've welcomed most of them on The Ticket because they're so eager for dialogue, involvement and follow the day's political events with admirable intensity.

These folks also devised some of the most imaginative fundraising schemes from mini-music concerts to Boston Tea Party re-enactments to music videos to pinup calendars showing female Ron Paul fans with very little clothing on, which only Ron Paul supporters are allowed to click here to see.

There was confusion after Paul knocked Romney out of the presidential contest about the congressman continuing his presidential race because he said he needed to focus on his House primary. But Paul vows to continue to run his hopeless campaign as long as his supporters support him and his ideas of strict constitutionalism. And now that he's waxed Peden, McCain had better watch out. Not by coincidence, McCain quickly left Texas after Paul's win, allegedly to visit the White House today.

Paul's supporters will explain below that if it wasn't for a vast media conspiracy, led by Fox News in cahoots with big banks and oil companies who tell newspapers what to print, their candidate might very well be the one celebrating 1,191 GOP delegates today. How Paul supporters know their candidate has been ignored when they claim to no longer read newspapers is unexplained.

Anyway, a few blogs such as The Ticket have explained Dr. Paul's plans to drastically downsize the federal government, bring all overseas American troops home and abolish the Federal Reserve because it does bad things. But apparently few voters read blogs or they don't care about Ron Paul.

Paul supporters explain now that winning elections isn't the only measure of success in politics and that they are driving a historic idea of restoring American freedoms whose time will come and actual contemporary votes are irrelevant. All of which is what candidates say about votes when they don't get many.

Speaking of votes and hopeless causes, another presidential contender and House member, Rep. Dennis Kucinich, was getting a sufficient number Tuesday night to beat back four primary challengers in his home Cleveland district. The main competitor was City Councilor Joe Cimperman, who trailed Kucinich 52% to 33% in early returns, despite several endorsements by the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

The liberal Kucinich dropped out of the Democratic presidential race and, using his list of national donors, most of whom don't live in Cleveland on purpose, Kucinich raised a reported $700,000 to protect his congressional seat.

Some political observers, who won't admit it now and also don't live in Cleveland by choice, thought Kucinich was in political trouble at home because he was always off somewhere else running for president and driving his hopeless agenda of impeaching President Bush and Vice President Cheney over starting the Iraq war. Cimperman ran ads parodying Kucinich's quixotic presidential campaign absences, but obviously they didn't work too well.

Now, Republican state Rep. Jim Trakas will have his turn to unseat the former Cleveland mayor in the general election Nov 4.

(UPDATE: Late returns indicate Kucinich won his primary by a 50:35 margin while Paul won his 70:30.)

Meanwhile, Kucinich is still married to his wife, Elizabeth, who looks a whole lot nicer than he does. So we're publishing her photo instead.

-- Andrew Malcolm

Photo: Elizabeth Kucinich (Mark Duncan / Associated Press)

Comments

[Ronnie]

"Meanwhile, Kucinich is still married to his wife, Elizabeth, who looks a whole lot nicer than he does. So we're publishing her photo instead."

Haha; good decision!

[tim, minnesota]

First, the video backup for my point is on Ron Paul web site and U-tube. The weekend of 2/23, Ron Paul held two rallies in Texas. The first at a hotel had 1200 supporters, the second at UT Austin had between 4K-6K supporters, and not one word in the national media about either Ron Paul event. MSM claims Ron is long shot dark horse. Ok, I give MSM that for making my point. Any newsworthy national media would report a nut job kook having 7,000 people attend his rallies in Texas.

The attendance is over twice Huckabee 2 events the next weekend at similar venues. The MSM could have reported a great story considering Huckabee poor event attendance relative to Ron. However, alas the MSM continues the media blackout. Even my dad called from California 2 weeks ago, giving condolences as the California media claimed Ron Paul quit the presidential bid. MSM does make or break a campaign. It is all about marketing, exposure, and more exposure. Unfortunately Ron Paul gets scrums for coverage, this on line media blog being an exception.

We are a long way from the convention, delegates are not counted or chosen in caucus states and conservative Republicans are no happier with McCain the day after super Tuesday #2.

(No blackout here.)

[Jack]

Go ahead, mock Ron Paul. He's the only candidate telling the truth, and that's the last thing most people seem to want to hear in this election year.

(I think he's a fascinating story, which is why we write about him so much.)

[Curtis]

I'm Glad Paul and Kucinich kept their jobs, and I'm glad Clinton won big on March 4th!

[Jason]

Do I sense some sarcasm?

Look, you can paint it however you want to. We are far and above, the most informed voters in this election. We believe in our guy. It is a real shame that Ron never got mentioned in a news article without the words "long shot" or "quixotic bid for the president" right afterwards. Thats not to say that the campaign didn't make mistakes that hurt themselves, because they certainly did. They never expected the support they got and seemed not to understand how to leverage it into wins.

If you look at this objectively, there has not been a movement like this in American politics since the Draft Goldwater movement in 1963. Someday you will look back and see that you were covering the story that changed the Republican Party. The real story is that the Paleo-con/libertarian wing of the party is not going to vote for McCain and he is going to lose the election. After that, disenfranchised neo-cons are going to have to reassess their positions, and we are going to be there to fill the void. A lot of people thought that congress was lost in 2006 because of the war, but I don't think that is so. I think they lost because tried and true GOP voters (like myself) didn't vote them back in because of massive deficits and growth of government.

2006 was the first time I didnt vote Republican and it was like having to put my dog to sleep. Something I didn't want to do emotionally, but something that had to be done. This fall is going to be no different. I'll probably vote third party again. Its depressing to think that the GOP is going to lose and lose big, but it really doesn't matter anymore. Ron Paul is something different and would have made a great president.

Although I disagree with Denis on most issues, I'm glad he won. He is another honest voice in congress and its sad the way his party bailed on him for telling the truth and not sticking to the story.

(You won't find longshot in here. You guys taught me that a long time ago.)

[Jim]

Your headline is funny.

Good for those guys.

We need more principled radicals and less appeasing centrists.

[Ron]

How many times can you use the word hopeless?

Mr. Malcom, if upwards of 70% of the American population wants out of Iraq, why do you think that the only anti-war Presidential candidate (for both parties) is getting 5-10% of the national vote?
Perhaps you could have turned on the tv over the last six months and counted the amount of on air minutes Dr. Paul had compared to the Guilianis, Romneys and McCains. Then you could have assumed that since 80% of Americans get their "news" from television, that some breaking story was evolving.
Maybe somebody at LA Times can moonlight as a journalist and get on that scoop.
Personally I think American's don't like his hair. Or his wife's body. Or the often repeated fact of just how old the poor man is!

[politics12]

What will the Republicans do when John McCain is forced to stand down as the Presidential nominee of the GOP when his unfortunate profiting from old buddy and Arizona Elect McCain Committee co-chair Congressman Rick Renzi's extortion, money laundering and land scams comes to light? Or will he just excuse himself and say 'It was a boneheaded thing to do?', which has already proved to be an effective excuse for another well known candidate?

Or is John McCain so well protected by his control of the Abramoff files and all the dirty deals of influence peddling chronicled therein that he is untouchable?

[MIKE WEST]

NO TRUER WORDS WERE EVER SPOKEN. MSM KILLED RON PAUL, BUT NOT HIS WORDS, THE REVELUTION LIVES ON

[Jay]

It takes several exposures to Ron Paul's message for Americans to "get it" due to the television brainwashing that has gone on for so long. People don't recognize that islamic fascists are represented in the same way communists were portrayed during the cold war. Fear is an effective tool. Highly motivated Ron Paul supporters engage people in conversation on buses, in workplaces, on college campuses and at family gatherings. I hope this leads to more dialogue throughout this country about a whole range of issues, less dependence on the media to provide a position on issues and less entertainment-driven individual isolationism.

[Ormely Gumphungent]

Being a Texas Republican, I voted and then attended the precinct convention after the close of the polls. At the meeting, a gentleman was present who presented about 15 resolutions for consideration. All but three of the resolutions passed with near, if not 100%, support of the attendees (only two of which were Ron Paul supporters). The resolutions were right out of the Ron Paul position papers though - small government, getting the US out of the UN and other multi-national groups, repealing the income tax, getting rid of multiple agencies of the federal government, etc. The ones which did not pass were to completely get out of Iraq, and to go to the gold standard. Overall it was quite enlightening to see that although the people found (and voted for) Dr. Paul's ideas to be overwhelmingly in-line with thier own wishes for how the government works, (and opposite that of which Mr. McCain preaches) they were not capable of realizing this when they voted not two hours earlier for who they wanted as leader of this country. How can a people exist for long when their schizophrenia is so deeply intrenched in them?

Orm

[frank]

Entertaining article as usual.

Ron Pauls message lives on.

RP 2012

[David]

And then there were two!

It's just Ron Paul vs. McCain now.

There are 7 more days of primaries and caucuses between now and the RNC, and you'll be damned if you tell the people in *those* states that their votes don't matter.

[Elizabeth]

Andrew,

You like that word, "hopeless", don't you? You use it a lot.

Although you have mentioned Paul's platform, you have never explained it. Which is something I, for one, have asked you to do a number of times. You seem content to skim the surface of events, instead of offering a deeper analysis that might actually give people some meaningful grist for their mental mills.

Elizabeth Kucinich is a lovely woman, and her love and support for her husband are evident on her face. But how is that related to the story?

Also, Andrew, I asked you a question in a previous post: Do you have any joy in your life? Or has your cynicism and resignation totally overwhelmed you? I ask this not to be critical but to get you thinking about how you see life and how that affects your writing, and, most likely, the rest of your life.

We'll keep reading if you'll keep writing.

Love, another Elizabeth

(It seems I'm hopelessly enthralled by the word hopeless, doesn't it? Mathematically it's true, but I see your point. We have written about Dr. Paul's platform and the other candidates' many times. In fact, long before any other media outlet paid attention, we devoted an entire item just to Dr. Paul's own words on his foreign policy platform. That may have been before you become so loyal to The Ticket. But if you click on Ron Paul in the subject listings to the right, you'll find it from last summer. We do always include the candidate's own website as well, so interested Ticket readers can go and find out more information on their own. we don't pretend to be an encyclopedia.)

[Jenn]

The newspeople in media have gotten way too influential in these elections and swaying people's votes. I don't care about their opinions and polls - I just want them to report the news with some journalistic integrity. I couldn't believe how the media treated Ron Paul, Kuccinich, Hunter, and others - such disrespect for our ELECTED officials. They were the only ones who brought some intellectual stimulation to these debates.

[Anarcissie]

Ron: ''Mr. Malcom, if upwards of 70% of the American population wants out of Iraq, why do you think that the only anti-war Presidential candidate (for both parties) is getting 5-10% of the national vote?'

Scientific research has shown that only five or ten per cent of tthe voters vote on a basis of ideology, policy or character, as perceived from evidence and the use of reason. Most vote emotionally and intuitively, and their major concerns are image and the perception of immediate self-interest. Most politicians and most of the media recognize this and treat candidates accordingly. Hence, although candidates like Ron Paul reflect what many voters claim are their principles or desires (such as getting out of Iraq) they do not succeed in the polls. If it's a conspiracy it's one in which most of the people collude.

[NiliePile]

"Paul's supporters will explain below that if it wasn't for a vast media conspiracy, lead by Fox News in cahoots with big banks and oil companies who tell newspapers what to print, their candidate might very well be the one celebrating 1,191 GOP delegates today."

Come on Andrew, you know that the MSM did marginalize Ron Paul from the beginning. No need to make fun of us Ron Paul supporters.

[Hart Williams]

"Meanwhile, Kucinich is still married to his wife, Elizabeth, who looks a whole lot nicer than he does. So we're publishing her photo instead."

So, why is YOUR picture up? Fair's fair, or, pot: kettle. Equal treatment for allegedly fugly-looking sexagenarians.

(Oh that one's simple. Cause it's my blog.)

[jennifer]

It's amazing to me when you ask why someone is voting for a candidate - I got many responses of "she's a woman", "I just like him/her", "he's black", "he's a tough guy" speaking about Hillary, Obama, and McCain - that they have no idea about where their candidates stand on the issues such as the economy, trade, and education. I wish people would realize this election isn't some scientific experiment - hey let's just elect him or her and see what happens.....Ron Paul supporters at least know where their candidate stands on FEDERAL issues. One issue voters are ruining our country.

[Ron Paul]

Great story!

You do realise from an Internet perspective this movement is historic? I'm a professional in the Internet industry and this movement has turned politics on its head.

Think of it in terms of p2p vs the record industry. That is what is happening to politics.

Well done for chronicling some of the story.

(Well, it's no accident we keep coming back to it, that's for sure.)

[iLoveRonPaul]

best. article. ever...

Also, I think I may have been more inclined to vote for Kucinich's wife...

[BuelahMan]

I found the article seriously UNfunny.

[Greg Morse]

"Meanwhile, Kucinich is still married to his wife, Elizabeth, who looks a whole lot nicer than he does. So we're publishing her photo instead."

Since you posted Ron Paul's picture, does this mean you find Ron Paul more attractive than his wife? There seems to be more to this story, Andrew.

[Lori]

Another useless article telling us how "HOPELESS" it is to care about freedom.

[lastnymleft]

You're almost there, Andrew. Two corrections, though:

(1) The conspiracy to shut down Ron Paul from the 2008 presidential campaign did not come *directly* from the big banks, and oil companies. They do it through instruments such as the Bilderberg Group, and their foreign policy arm, the Council on Foreign relations, which sets the agenda, and the *other* candidates, and the major media heads, that are ALL members, put the plan into action.

(2) You said "How Paul supporters know their candidate has been ignored when they claim to no longer read newspapers is unexplained." Well, no, it's not unexplained at all. It's proven, via independent, authoritative source: the "Project on Excellence in Journalism" at http://www.journalism.org has been examining media coverage on a weekly basis. They have shown that Dr Paul has been given less than 1% of significant media coverage for the last seven weeks straight, including key weeks, such as the lead up to Super Tuesday, when he received statistically ZERO significant news coverage. That week was the week in which the 4th quarter donation tallies were released by the FEC, showing Dr Paul raising a stunning $20M - far more than any other Republican - and also the week in which it was revealed he received more donations from individual members of the military than ALL other candidates - Dem and Repub - COMBINED. He also got a second in one of the states, during that week, but that was ignored, too. How could he have got ZERO significant coverage in that week, given those MAJOR stories...if not a conspiracy to black him out, and shut down his campaign?
Don't believe me? Look: http://journalism.org/node/9610 (See the table down the bottom (not even the PEJ mentions him in their graphs, or their commentary)
http://journalism.org/news_index

This is being noted, and will not be tolerated. Hell hath no fury like a r3V0Lution scorned.